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CINDY LANDOLT was born in the small town of Näfels, high

in the Swiss Alps, a region known for its outdoor sports scene, a lifestyle that Cindy adopted from a very early age. It was this embracing of all things physical that lead her to gymnastics, a sport in which she excelled in her early years. Cindy was forced to stop only due to her growth spurt in her early teens. Standing 1 meter 79cm 5’10.5”, Cindy embarked on a career as a professional model, appearing in many fashion campaigns and TV shows culminating in her Miss Zurich entry in 2004.Throughout her successful modeling career, Cindy always kept one hand firmly on her love for physical activity and training, often in conflict with the desires of her management and booking agents, who would cite her physical stature and muscularity as a negative point in the world of high fashion.

A decision had to be made, and Cindy chose to pursue her interest in optimising the physical capability of the human body. She enrolled in the Swiss Academy of Fitness and Sports ‘SAFS’ and became a qualified personal trainer

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By Cindy Landolt

My body is my CV, it’s the result of

the application of my techniques

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and fitness instructor with a federal specialised document, a nutrition coach, rehabilitation coach, workout/strength training specialist, weight loss specialist and sports related coach, preparing sports professionals for their competitions.

“I wanted to become as academically qualified as was possible, but I knew that no amount of text books and theory would substitute for the experience gained from working directly with clients.

“I quickly found work at a nearby gym and began applying the theory, but also learning the variances that exist from one trainee to the next. I remember realising that there was no ‘one-size-fits- all’ method for taking someone to their physical optimum. But at the same time

there were some common threads throughout all trainees and all training methods, a commonality that was irrefutable. It was with this learning over the course of 8 years that I created my own personal training company in Zurich. I began to create very effective training and nutrition programmes for my clients, they weren’t particularly complicated (they didn’t need to be). I never strayed far from the governing dynamics that I had discovered through my own training and that of my earlier clients. It was this refined training process that I applied with great success, so much so that I was able to create my own training facility in Zurich ‘The Centurion Club’. It was the logical next step, to provide the perfect environment to train my clients without excuses, I simply left no room for failure”. When asked about her own training, Cindy simply states “My body is my CV, it’s the result of the application of my techniques, I train my clients the

same way I train myself, in the same gym, with the same equipment, everything is done to the clock. I cannot gauge someone’s progress if they took 3 minutes between sets this week and 2 minutes last week, I control all variables. Reps, cadence, rest and execution. The only metric I concern myself with seeing in the gym is an increase in strength, I train clients with the objective of small incremental increases in resistance over a long period of time, this ensures trackable progress each and every week and also provides the client with the critical sense of victory and achievement, this keeps them on course mentally, which is more than half of the battle.

“If I had to give one piece of advice it would be to ‘reduce to the maximum’ in the knowledge that there is only a given amount of stimulus stress (training) that can be applied to the trainee’s body in a given period of time, and that their own capacity to recover from that training is heavily governed by their natural genetic capacity, life commitments and age.

“For any given body part, I create brief, very high intensity training modules, these had been refined to such an extent that my workouts often consist of only 8-12 sets per workout, not per exercise, but total per workout. When doing this however, each rep of each set must be performed with absolute maximal effort, which in turn requires excellent form to ensure the trainee isn’t injured. This is where my experience truly helps, I am quickly able to asses a trainee’s weak spots or areas of mechanical

Reduce to the Maximum

disadvantage and ensure these areas aren’t overdriven due to poor exercise selection.

“I’m often asked about ‘over training’ and how to detect it, in reality, when it comes to resistance training, over training is somewhat of a myth, you are more likely to be ‘under recovered’ than over trained. That being said, resistance training when looking to increase muscle density and sculpt the body is far better performed in set and rep ranges that won’t permit over training, at least not if you are doing it right. I see people training with a weight that is barely stimulating growth, searching for the unnecessary pump sensation, and sure, you can do that for high repetitions and multiple sets, but if I align your form and provide you with a weight that is your

ALL OUT maximum for say 8 reps, and you complete that set with the extreme intensity that it requires (or should require if you are intending to break new ground and become stronger), how many sets do you think you can do? 2? 3? At most, even then I would most likely need to reduce the weight for you to hit your target of 8 reps or maintain that weight and set a new target of 5 reps.

“Use the maximum resistance that you can perform the optimum number of reps and sets of the ideal exercise for the goal in perfect form!

“I won’t go into the deep specifics of my exercise selection as that would most likely take up this entire magazine, and there are subtle variances in exercises that I would prescribe based on your body type and goal. What I will say is, in

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For any given body part, I

create brief, very high intensity

training modules

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Reduce to the Maximum

heart and lungs, not for its secondary benefit of fat loss. Cardio for fat loss is a difficult task for many reasons, I have a lot of clients who, when they first visit me, are exhausted from CV training that ultimately yielded zero results and placed them in a catabolic (muscle destroying) state.

“Remember to always use the right tool for the job.

“That’s it, then eat according to your goal, get the necessary rest, repeat the process with a small increase in resistance and let the results become a function of time.

“Once you truly understand this principal you are ahead of 99% of trainees out there! Decrease your training volume, increase your training intensity, optimise your diet, maximise your rest and recovery.”

Reduce to the MaximumCindy has written numerous highly detailed articles on the subject of training and nutrition in Switzerland as well as regular columns in Swiss newspapers and television appearances. Cindy also provides FREE training and nutrition related E-Books which can all be downloaded here:

www.centurionclub.training

I use cardio training for its primary benefits to my heart and lungs, not for its secondary benefit of fat loss

In the next issue of Muscle & Fitness Hers, Cindy will be explaining how to create the perfect weight training routine, and why the routine itself is the icing on the cake of a deeper understanding of the fundamentals of resistance training, rest and nutrition.

my experience as both a trainer of others and myself, I have never needed more than four training sessions per week, each lasting between 45-55 minutes.

“You must get out of the mindset that racking up hours in the gym directly correlates to your results. You need to optimise your training and do just enough damage (training induced stimulus) to the muscle fibre that it is only just capable of recovering in time for the next session. You must train for results, NOT to simply ‘satisfy your conscience’ by ‘clocking in’ for protracted workouts that yield nothing more than a ‘misplaced sense of satisfaction’ based on the myth that more training volume gives more results when keeping in mind that our objective is to increase muscle density, size and shape.

“Beyond that, I control and reduce body fat with my diet, I use cardio training for its primary benefits to my

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